RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA IN KURDISH AREAS

Wanganui Chronicle, 9 September 1950, Page 5

RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA IN KURDISH AREAS

LONDON, Sept. 8 (Recd. 6 pm).— A warning that Russian propaganda among the Kurdish minority in Persia is being intensified and that it has dangerous implications because of the proximity of the Kurdish territories to Persian oilfields, is given by the Labour member for West Gloucestershire, Mr. M. Philips Price, in an article in tne "Manchester Guardian.” Mr. Price, who has travelled extensively i n Persia, Anatolia and Iraq, recalls that three years ago, when he last visited Persian Kurdistan, the Russians were busily stirring up trouble among tribesmen. He points cut that even in Czarist days il was the Russian policy to encourage Kurdish nationalist aspirations in order to embarrass Turkey. Since the Turkish revolution the Turks had been fairly successful in placating their Kurdish minority, but Mr. Price suggests that Russian propaganda may prove more successful in Persia and Iraq, where it is supporting extremist, demands for the creation of an independent State of Kurdistan. —Special N.Z.P.A. Correspondent.